May 2016

Director’s Message

We have had a very exciting month so far.

The Campus Creche Trust officially took over Fraser’s Little Feet on Monday, 9 May. The week before there was a powhiri to welcome Creche to the centre. This was a significant event and it was wonderful to see so many of our Creche staff attend. Thank you to Marina at Frasers for organising the event. Mel McFarlane has been seconded as the Centre Manager / Team Leader and Carol Walters has been seconded there for 3 months to work in the Under 2 area.

Our Kauri centre was in the limelight last week. Vanessa nominated Yoshie for a national award for the work she does teaching our tamariki sign language. Yoshie and the team won the Deaf Aotearoa NZ Sign Language National Award in Early Childhood.

Yoshie and Sarah Yi attended the award dinner in Wellington recently. This is fantastic and I am so proud of the work that Yoshie and the Kauri team are doing, teaching children sign language.

The construction of the new Maire building is moving forward and we now have a date that we will be moving out of the old building. We will be operating from the temporary premises from Monday, 4 July. The University has kindly lent us our temporary premises which was the old Management School computer lab. We can see the building from Creche, so it is not too far away. The outside ‘play area’ will be fenced. The premises will have a temporary Ministry of Education license.

Whekī

We would like to extend a very warm welcome to Lennon. We look forward to getting to know you and working together in partnership.

Ka kite to Mai-Aorere and Dane who have recently transitioned to Kōwhai. We wish you all the very best in your new adventures. Ka kite to Anaya who has left Creche.

We have been enjoying many sensory activities over the last month, enjoying them both indoors and outdoors.

Kōwhai

Kia ora Kōwhai whānau!

A very warm welcome to Mai-Aorere, Dane and their whānau to our centre! It’s great to have you with us and we look forward to Kaliya, Laura and Ezmay joining us over the coming weeks too.

We’ve had an interesting month in Kōwhai. We commemorated ANZAC Day with the children, painting poppies and making ANZAC biscuits. We recognise that this is an important event and many of our families and children observe this day outside the centre.

We are embracing the cooler autumn weather that is upon us! Our days are filled with the wonder and excitement of leaves and their ever changing colours, as well as raking them, collecting them, blowing them, throwing them around and having the occasional leaf fight!

As a result, children are getting more wet than usual, so a gentle reminder to please pack extra changes of clothes and socks. Gumboots and rain jackets are also a bonus! Could you please ensure that ALL items of clothing are labelled.

We are excited about the Matariki celebrations coming up next month. This is an important time of year in Māori culture and we plan to celebrate this in our centre over the coming weeks. If there are families that would like to participate or contribute in any way, we would really appreciate this. Feel free to come in and share your thoughts and ideas with our friendly staff! J

Just to let you know, Carol is enjoying her new role at our Fraser site and Stacy, who we mentioned last month would be joining us, has taken up a position at a new centre.

Nīkau

Over the last couple of weeks, we visited Finn’s parent’s restaurant Dough Bros. Our tamariki enjoyed watching pizza bases getting made, picking their toppings and then making their own individual pizzas. We all then got to watch as the pizza went into the fire oven to be cooked. Thank you to Finn’s family and the Dough Bros staff for allowing us to have lunch in a nice restaurant with our friends. We had so much fun and it was an awesome experience!

We would like to extend a huge welcome to our student teacher, Linda who is here with us for seven weeks. She is a third year student from the University of Waikato.

The weather is quite unpredictable at the moment. We ask that you please provide your child with multiple layers, so that we can take off or put on clothing as and when needed. Please also ensure that all clothing is named as it is much easier to return named clothing to its owner.

Our lost and found baskets are once again almost over flowing. Can you please check and see if any of these items belong to your children.

Maire

Kia ora Maire whānau

We would like to say ka kite to Emily, LJ, Olivia and their whānau, we know you will have an awesome time at Kauri.

We have had some exciting news! We will be moving into our temporary premises down the hill from Monday, 4 July while our old whare is removed and replaced. We are going to have an awesome time down the hill, it will be a bit like camping.

To celebrate our new whare we have to first celebrate our old whare, the tamariki and whānau that it housed and all the many staff that have worked there. So our last celebration in our Maire whare will be Matariki. This is to remember old times and welcome new times. We will send out a newsletter and more information nearer the time.

Our tamariki are taking an interest in numeracy and literacy which is really exciting so we have created a literacy corner.

We have incorporated name recognition into whānau time. We are also looking at taking some of our tamariki to different libraries in the community.

As you may have noticed Ilaise has been missing for a little while, she has been seconded to Kauri for a short while.

Special congratulations to Yoshie, from Kauri for winning a New Zealand Sign Language award. That is awesome!

Lastly we would like to say a special Hari huritau to all the pepe born in Haratua.

Ngā mihi nui

Maire kaiako

Kauri

Yoshie has been seconded to the Head Teachers role at Kauri due to Mel moving to Fraser’s as the Centre Manager.

Last week we welcomed Ilaise who will be with us for the next few months. Some of you may already know Ilaise as she has been both a student and then a staff member at Maire. Ilaise has also worked in the Holiday Programme. It is a pleasure to have you here Ilaise, welcome to our team.

We wish Calvin and Lucian farewell as they move on to school and welcome Olivia, Emily, LJ and Renee to Kauri. We hope you and your families enjoy your time with us.

Transitions to Kauri are going well and the children, both newcomers from outside and those transitioning from Maire and Nīkau are settling in really well and seem to feel quite at home in Kauri. We have had positive feedback from parents saying how happy their child is to come to Kauri.

We celebrated Sign Language Week with a performance by our children which was absolutely amazing. Thank you to those parents and grandparents who took the time to come in to support our tamariki for this celebration. The children and staff have spent a lot of time and effort learning the songs and signs.

Yoshie has brought this passion to our centre and this has paid off, with Yoshie being invited to Wellington to receive the award for NZ Sign Language for Early Childhood Education. Congratulations Yoshie! Our children have been a vital part of this journey and it is amazing to see how well they have embraced this.

Group Time children have been focusing on learning all about farms and we were fortunate to be able to take the children for a visit to Jenny’s farm. What a wonderful hands-on learning experience it was for the children.

Holiday Programme

Our next Holiday Programme is in July, commencing on Monday, 11July for 2 weeks. They are heading to Te Aroha Hot Pools for the first week and then going rock climbing at Extreme Edge for the second week.

The programme runs from 8.00 am to 5.30 pm. Weekly and daily bookings are available.

If you wish to enrol your child/ren for future sessions in 2016, please contact the Creche Office to pick up an enrolment form.

Enrolment forms are also available from Kauri.

Immunisations

It is important that we have your child’s most recent immunisation certificate. This has been highlighted with the recent measles outbreak and with schools in the Waikato being closed. Please bring in your child’s certificate to the Office so that we can copy this or scan through a copy. Should you choose to not immunise your child, this is fine, but please make sure you have e-mailed or given the Office something in writing so that it can be noted on your child’s file.

Absences due to Sickness

Unfortunately, this time of year a lot of our tamariki come down with all sorts of nasties like colds, runny noses and high temperatures. Our centre policy states that if a child has a temperature of 38 degrees or higher then we are required to call parents to come and collect him/her. Please understand that we are doing this to ensure the health and well‑being of all our tamariki – and teachers.

Please remember we are a Pamol and paracetamol free Creche. We will not administer Pamol if your child is unwell or has a fever. We recommend that if a child needs Pamol, they stay at home, rest and get well. Pamol is only given in exceptional circumstances when pain relief may help or support a child.